For about 8 hours now, the golf world has done its level best to create a buzz about Captain Davis Love III’s four selections. Pundits have tried to determine if Team USA’s leader made proper or improper choices for the final four spots. I’ve no say in that matter, but I will give my perspective on what happened and what it might mean for Team USA’s chances at Medinah in September.
Captain Love (sounds like a 60s-era rock and roller) chose numbers 10, 11, 13 and 15 from the USA Ryder Cup points list. Since the first 8 qualified automatically, this means that numbers 9 and 14 were left off the team. Number 9 is Hunter Mahan and number 14, Bo Van Pelt. In no one’s mind was BVP ever a serious candidate to make the team as a Captain’s pick. He has had a solid two years, but he doesn’t win with any regularity and he doesn’t have any great skill (read: putter) that elevates him under pressure above the others. Mahan, on the other hand, has international team experience…loads of it. He has been a focal presence on the last five US teams.
Mahan was a high-profile loser to Graeme McDowell in the 2010 Ryder Cup singles, coming up short in the decisive match that Sunday in Wales. He was on the winning sides in the 2007, 2009 and 2011 Presidents’ Cups and the 2008 Ryder Cup. So why not Mahan? It is a great question. One reason is that Hunter cooled off after a hot start to 2012. The other is, he may not be perceived as a young gun with potential (worth the risk) nor a wily veteran (worth the experience), but rather, a tweener who ought to earn his way onto the team.
Let’s look at the guys who made the team. The guarantees, in my mind, were Steve Stricker and Dustin Johnson. Stricker is a wily verteran yet is still a great putter. Johnson is a tweener who bombs the ball and loves the money games. Stricker can partner Tiger Woods and Johnson can perhaps match up with Keegan Bradley to create a Young Bombers’ partnership.
Webb Simpson, Keegan Bradley and Jason Dufner (automatic qualifiers) will make their first Ryder Cup starts in 2012. Matt Kuchar and Bubba Watson, their second. Five of eight automatic qualifiers have a total of 2 starts in Ryder Cup play. Is it any wonder that DL3 went for grizzled vets Stricker and Furyk? Why Snedeker, who has zero international experience to speak of? He can putt and he’s playing well. And, in a moment of poetic justice, he gets an international cap nearly ten years after he was hosed by the USGA during its 2003 Walker Cup team selection.
